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Obama to China: Tear Down this Firewall

Bart Salisbury — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 15:05:00 -0600

At at townhall style session with Chinese students in Shanghai, President Obama spoke up for an uncensored Internet. “I am a big believer in technology and I’m a big believer in openness when it comes to the flow of information,” the President said in response to a student’s question, following up with “I think that the more freely information flows, the stronger the society becomes, because then citizens of countries around the world can hold their own governments accountable. They can begin to think for themselves. That generates new ideas. It encourages creativity.” 

Mr. Obama was treading carefully, given the Chinese government’s careful control of Internet content, derisively referred to as “the great firewall.” During the days surrounding the 20th anniversary of Tiananmen Square, for example, the Chinese government blocked access to popular Web sites, such as Hotmail, Flickr and Twitter. (YouTube has been blocked since March.)

The President added: “I’ve always been a strong supporter of open Internet use. I’m a big supporter of non-censorship. This is part of the tradition of the United States that I discussed before, and I recognize that different countries have different traditions. I can tell you that in the United States, the fact that we have free Internet — or unrestricted Internet access is a source of strength, and I think should be encouraged.”

Mr. Obama’s comments were webcast, via the White House web site, but were only available in transcript form within China. Broadcast of the event was limited to Shanghai.

In a revealing movement, Mr. Obama confessed to be a Twitter virgin. “Well, first of all, let me say that I have never used Twitter. … My thumbs are too clumsy to type in things on the phone.”

Image: Pete Souza/The White House

German Murderer Seeks to Censor Wikipedia

Ryan Whitwam — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 19:01:27 -0600

A well known Bavarian actor by the name of Walter Sedlmayr was murdered in 1990. Two of his associated were tried and convicted of the crime. These men were recently paroled, and one of them is none too pleased that anyone can read all about him on the internet. He has retained a lawyer and has sued Wikipedia in Germany, and is also making noise about suing the English language version.

This all comes back to German law, which holds that private citizens should have their names and likenesses protected. The ex-convict is making the argument that while he may have been a public figure during the trial, he isn’t anymore. He wants the Sedlmayr page censored to remove all mention of him.

The EFF is strongly opposed to the possibility of censoring Wikipedia at the behest of a convicted murderer (or anyone for that matter). They point out that is it impossible for all publications to abide by the censorship laws of any legal system. The U.S. First Amendment protects this sort of speech, but how far will the German lawyers try to take this?

China Testing Green Dam for Mac OSX and Still Pushing Ahead Despite Security Warnings

Justin Kerr — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 16:25:26 -0500

Despite recently announced delays in China’s requirement to include Green Dam anti-pornography software on new PCs, the initiative is far from dead. PC makers who unanimously decried the hasty July 1st deadline managed to buy themselves an extension, but are still being told they to comply with the new requirements. The Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology re-affirmed its commitment to Green Dam Youth Escort on Thursday, and claims that it sees the software as being an important tool for protecting young people from pornography and violence on the internet. To further reinforce its commitment to total penetration, software publisher Jinhui has been told to write a Mac OSX version of the software, and it is currently in beta testing.

Critics of the Green Dam filtering software continue to question the motivation behind the initiative, and have accused the Ministry of using the software to further political repression. This may be a valid concern when you consider that the Ministry in charge of Green Dam’s implantation is also responsible for suppressing illegal political activity. The situation for the Chinese gets even worse when you consider that several industry tests have shown multiple security vulnerabilities in the filtering software, and it even appears to have a high occurrence of false positives in the filtering algorithm. The vulnerabilities are considered so serious in fact, that Sony is including a disclaimer with all new PCs.

Will Linux be the only safe haven for the Chinese?

China’s War Against Pornography Targets Google

Justin Kerr — Sun, 28 Jun 2009 14:10:58 -0500

The Chinese Health Ministry has been waging a very public war against pornography lately, and although they appeared to be softening their approach, new developments on Thursday have left Google scrambling. In what some people are calling “a rigged demo”, a CCTV state-owned television monopoly broadcast an interview demonstrating the dangers of the Google Suggested Search feature which attempts to auto complete simple search terms with popular related queries. At one point during the interview, when the host typed the word “son” into Google, a suggested search was returned stating, “abnormal relationship between son and mother”.

Google has formally commented on the matter, and has explained that the suggested search feature is based on popularity. In their defense, Google claims that nobody had entered this phrase for several months, but the term suddenly became popular in Beijing in the days leading up to the show. Though this is hardly conclusive evidence of a conspiracy, it certainly falls into the category of “suspicious” if true. Regardless, Google claims to be working on a new system that would help it remove all traces of pornography from its Chinese database, but describes it as “a major engineering effort”. "Google has been working to remove pornography from our search results in China, in accordance with our operating license there," the company said.

Google already filters a significant amount of political content from its search results, and critics fear that further censorship will only complicate the efforts of rights activists. It is also worth noting that the government agency charged with cracking down on pornography, is also responsible for suppressing illegal political activity. American officials have been critical of knee jerk restrictions on companies trying to comply with Chinas increasing demand for pornography censorship, and I’m sure we will hear more on this issue in the coming months.

What do you think of the ongoing developments in China?

Image Credit: floriswiegerinck.nl

Nokia Siemens Denies Supplying Internet Monitoring Tech to Iran

Pulkit Chandna — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 16:04:23 -0500

Nokia Siemens Networks has repelled suggestions that Iran is using technology provided by the company to furtively keep a tab on the online activities of its citizens. The company came under suspicion after it was observed in a Wall Street Journal report that it could have supplied the necessary eavesdropping equipment to Iran, although it was more a surmisal rather than a firm accusation.

The company has defended itself by claiming that it only furnished telecommunications equipment - freely deployed by Western democracies as well - that can only be used to intercept voice calls. It denies selling any internet technology to Iran. A spokesman for the company reassured everyone that Nokia Siemens holds its own code of conduct and international trade laws sacrosanct and acts in accordance with them.

CyberSitter Code Found in China Censorship Software

Mark Edward Soper — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 16:51:23 -0500

What do Solid Oak Software's CyberSitter and China's Green Dam Youth Escort Internet filtering programs have in common? According to the BBC, the answer is CyberSitter code. The BBC reports that both Solid Oak's Brian Milburn and a report from the University of Michigan conclude that the developer of Green Dam Youth Escort, Computer System Engineering Inc, have incorporated code from CyberSitter into Green Dam - without a license.

According to the China Daily, Solid Oak is sending "cease and desist" letters to HP and Dell to stop shipping computers bundled with Green Dam, and may seek legal action against the developers. The legal-technical drama is being played out against the background of China's requirement that all new systems sold as of July 1 include Green Dam, as we reported last week.

Green Dam now appears to be taking steps to clean up its act. Version 3.174 of Green Dam has been modified from earlier versions, according to an updated report from the University of Michigan dated today (June 18th). The new version does not use blacklist files from CyberSitter and makes other changes to help improve security, although the researchers conclude the software is still vulnerable to attacks. Stay tuned to MaximumPC.com for more in the continuing saga of Green Dam.

Image adapted from Wikimedia Commons image.

China's New Censorship Software a Potential "Large-Scale Disaster"

Mark Edward Soper — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 14:21:23 -0500

The Chinese government is requiring all PC makers selling into the China market to bundle Green Dam Youth Escort web filtering software as of July 1, as we reported earlier this week. This software, already widely used in China's schools and elsewhere, has plenty of flaws, BBC News reports:

Unencrypted connections between client PCs and the company's servers, which could lead to information theft or the PCs being turned into botnet nodes for malware attacks
Filtering only Internet Explorer browsers, not Firefox
Support only for Microsoft Windows
Inaccurate web site blocking
Potential privacy risks for users because the software logs all web pages the user attemps to access

Right now, it seems as if Green Dam Youth Escort is incapable of meeting its specified goals of "healthy development of the internet" and "effectively manag[ing] harmful material for the public and prevent it from being spread," while providing a terrific opportunity for malware providers. Have you encountered similar problems with web filtering software? Hit Comment to sound off.

China Demands All New PCs Include Censorship Software

Mark Edward Soper — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 18:30:01 -0500

The Chinese government takes the threat of unfettered Internet access seriously. China's "Great Firewall" blocked access to reports about the 20th anniversary of the 1989 Tianamen Square massacre last week. Although some users bypassed the blocks by using proxy servers, China's upped the ante: The Australian reports that China is requiring that all new PCs sold in China starting July 1st must include website blocking software developed in China.

The software's Chinese name is "Green Dam-Youth Escort". The word "green" in Chinese is used to describe web-surfing free from pornography and other illicit content.

The software was developed by Jinhui Computer System Engineering, with input from Beijing Dazheng Human Language Technology Academy. Both companies have ties to China's military and its security ministry. Jinhui says Green Dam operates similarly to software in other countries designed to let parents block access to web content inappropriate for children.

Foreign industry officials who have examined Green Dam say that personal information could be transmitted through the software and that it will be difficult for users to tell what exactly is being blocked.

Green Dam-Youth Escort can be preinstalled on systems sold in China, or be bundled with systems sold there. Although the developer states that the software contains a password-based parental bypass feature and can be uninstalled, one wonders if China will allow web access if the software is not active. Will the biggest PC vendors in the Chinese market (second only to the US market in sales last year) push back against this requirement, or will July 1st see the "Great Firewall" become even harder to crack? Hit Comment to post your feedback.